ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2019
Evidence for distinct biodevelopmental influences on male sexual orientation.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 18 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
18 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- In support of 2D:4D: More data exploring its conflicting results on handedness, sexual orientation and sex differences.PloS one · 2023Pooled it
- Meta-Analyses of Fraternal and Sororal Birth Order Effects in Homosexual Pedophiles, Hebephiles, and Teleiophiles.Archives of sexual behavior · 2021Pooled it
- Biodevelopmental Correlates of Sexual Orientation in Men: Evidence from a Polish Sample.Archives of sexual behavior · 2025Article
- Crusaders, monks and family fortunes: evolutionary models of male homosexuality and related phenomena.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2025Article
- Sexual orientation is associated with 2D:4D finger length ratios in both sexes: an updated and expanded meta-analysis.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Review
- Examining the Fraternal Birth Order Effect and Sexual Orientation: Insights from an East European Population.Archives of sexual behavior · 2024Article
- Fertility of Czech Gay and Straight Men, Women, and Their Relatives: Testing the Sexually Antagonistic Gene Hypothesis.Archives of sexual behavior · 2024Article
- Male androphilia, fraternal birth order, and female fecundity in Samoa: A 10-y retrospective.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2023Article
- The Biodevelopment of Sexual Orientation: Beyond the Known Horizon.Archives of sexual behavior · 2023Article
- Did Prosociality Drive the Evolution of Homosexuality? Response to Barron (2020).Archives of sexual behavior · 2021Article
- An anthropometric study of sexual orientation and gender identity in Thailand.Scientific reports · 2021Article
- Differences in digit ratios between gay men who prefer receptive versus insertive sex roles indicate a role for prenatal androgen.Scientific reports · 2021Article
- Sexual Dimorphism in Language, and the Gender Shift Hypothesis of Homosexuality.Frontiers in psychology · 2021Article
- Male sexual orientation, gender nonconformity, and neural activity during mental rotations: an fMRI study.Scientific reports · 2020Article
- Did Prosociality Drive the Evolution of Homosexuality?Archives of sexual behavior · 2020Article
- Sexual partner preference in animals and humans.Neuroscience and biobehavioral reviews · 2020Review
- Programmed for Preference: The Biology of Same-Sex Attraction in Rams.Neuroscience and biobehavioral reviews · 2020Review
- Prosociality and a Sociosexual Hypothesis for the Evolution of Same-Sex Attraction in Humans.Frontiers in psychology · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Several biological mechanisms have been proposed to influence male sexual orientation, but the extent to which these mechanisms cooccur is unclear. Putative markers of biological processes are often used to evaluate the biological basis of male sexual orientation, including fraternal birth order, handedness, and familiality of same-sex sexual orientation; these biomarkers are proxies for immunological, endocrine, and genetic mechanisms. Here, we used latent profile analysis (LPA) to assess whether these biomarkers cluster within the same individuals or are present in different subgroups of nonheterosexual men. LPA defined four profiles of men based on these biomarkers: 1) A subgroup who did not have these biomarkers, 2) fraternal birth order, 3) handedness, and 4) familiality. While the majority of both heterosexual and nonheterosexual men were grouped in the profile that did not have any biomarker, the three profiles associated with a biomarker were composed primarily of nonheterosexual men. We then evaluated whether these subgroups differed on measures of gender nonconformity and personality that reliably show male sexual orientation differences. The subgroup without biomarkers was the most gender-conforming whereas the fraternal birth order subgroup was the most female-typical and agreeable, compared with the other profiles. Together, these findings suggest there are multiple distinct biodevelopmental pathways influencing same-sex sexual orientation in men.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.